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A  STUDY 

IN  ENGLISH  METRICS 


BY      ADELAIDE      CRAPSEY 


VERSE 

A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS 


A  STUDY 
IN  ENGLISH  METRICS 


By 
ADELAIDE  CRAPSEY 


New  York 
ALFRED    A.   KNOPF 

MCMXVIII 


COPYRIGHT,  1918,  BY 
ESTHER  LOWENTHAL 


PBiirrED  ra  the  united  states  of  amebioa 


!^  f^ 


AN  INTRODUCTORY  NOTE 

It  is  hoped  that  the  study  here  presented  may 
prove  of  value  not  only  to  professional  students 
of  metrics  but  to  all  who  are  seriously  interested 
in  poetry.  It  forms  only  one  part,  in  itself  com- 
plete, of  an  investigation  of  certain  problems  in 
verse  structure  the  full  carrying  out  of  which  was 
prevented  by  Miss  Crapsey's  death  in  the  autumn 
of  1914.  An  indication  of  what  remained  to  do 
may  be  found  in  the  note  appended  to  the  essay. 
The  tables  printed  as  Additional  Analysis  pre- 
sent a  portion  of  the  data  which  had  been  col- 
lected for  a  second  part  of  the  study. 

To  any  one  who  reads  to  the  end,  it  must  be 
evident,  that  Miss  Crapsey  regarded  the  use  of 
exact  measurement  and  analysis — which  prob- 
ably is  denoted  as  the  application  of  phonetics  to 
metrics? — as  essential  to  the  "finer  and  righter" 
appreciation  of  poetry ;  that  she  considered  a  full 
awareness  of  technique  the  necessary  equipment 
of  one  who  would  understand  fully  the  subtle  and 
delicate  beauty  of  verse.    This  is  a  position  that 


6         AN  INTRODUCTORY  NOTE 

has  long  been  won  in  regard  to  music;  no  one 
would  attempt  to  be  a  critic  of  musical  composi- 
tion who  was  unaware  of  the  technical  problems 
of  musical  construction.  Is  it  not  likely  that  the 
criticism  of  poetry  may  become  far  more  signifi- 
cant when  our  literary  critics  consider  necessary 
a  corresponding  equipment?  At  least  it  may  be 
stated  that  the  laborious  analysis  was  in  Miss 
Crapsey's  case  dictated  by  an  acute  sense  of  the 
beauty  of  verse,  by  an  aesthetic  experience  of 
unusual  intensity.  To  one  who  knew  her  and 
watched  her  work  Miss  Crapsey's  untimely  death 
seems  to  have  brought  about  a  double  frustration ; 
it  prevented  the  completion  of  the  study  in  pros- 
ody and  the  undertaking,  which  that  study  would 
so  much  have  enriched,  of  a  series  of  essays  in 
criticism.  That  a  scientific  knowledge  of  the 
technique  of  verse  may  be  a  potent  tool  in  the 
hand  of  the  poet  also  will  probably  at  once  occur 

to  the  readers  of  Miss  Crapsey's  verse. 

E.  L. 


SYNOPSIS 

MAIN  THESIS 

That  an  important  application  of  phonetics  to 
metrical  problems  lies  in  the  study  of  phonetic 
word-structure. 

SUB-THESIS    UNDER    PRESENT    CONSIDERATION 

That  systematic  analysis  of  English  poems 
indicates  the  existence  of  a  distinct  structural 
differentiation  of  vocabularies  into  three  main 
types : 

I.  A  type  of  vocabulary  purely,  or  mainly, 
mono-dissyllabic,  i.  e,,  showing  a  characteristic 
occurrence  of  polysyllables  running  from  0  to 
about  2%. 

II.  A  type  of  medium  structural  complexity, 
i,  e,,  showing  a  characteristic  occurrence  of  poly- 
syllables running  from  about  3%-  to  about  5^/2% » 
with  a  tendency  to  drop  towards  2%  and  to  rise 
towards  6%. 

III.  A  type  of  extreme  structural  com- 
plexity, L  e,,  showing  a  characteristic  occurrence 


8 SYNOPSIS  

of  polysyllables  running  from  about  7%  to  about 
8%%,  with  a  tendency  to  drop  towards  6%  and 
to  rise  towards  914%  (or  10%  ?) . 

Note:  The  term  "polysyllable"  is  used  to  in- 
clude all  words  over  two  syllables  in  length. 

The  discussion  of  the  sub-thesis  falls  into  three 
main  parts: 

A,  Presentation  of  analysis 

1.  Derivation  of   scale  of  polysyllabic  occur- 

rence for  experimental  testing  from 

(a)  125  Nursery  Rhymes 

(b)  Milton  (Table  I) 

(c)  Pope  (Table  II) 

2.  First  testing  of  scale  from  the  work  of 

(a)  Tennyson  (Table  III) 

(b)  Swinburne  (Table  IV) 

(c)  Francis  Thompson  (Table  V) 

(d)  Maurice  Hewlett    (Table  VI) 

B,  Summary   of   three   important   points   in- 

volved in  differentiation  of  vocabularies 

1.  Elementary    word-forms    entering 

into  combination 

2.  Range  of  values  in  word-accent 

3.  Conditions  of  "weighting" 


SYNOPSIS  9 


C,  Importance  of  differentiation  of  vocabu- 
laries in  study  of  Metrics  indicated  mith 
reference   to 

1.  The  problem  as  a  whole 

2.  Tennyson  and  the  development  of 

the  decasyllable 

3.  Swinburne  and  the  development  of 

triple  rhythms 


A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS 


A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS 

It  is  my  object  in  the  *  prei^ent^  disoii^^loil- to 
venture  the  suggestion  that  an  important  appli- 
cation of  phonetics  to  metrical  problems  lies  in 
the  study  of  phonetic  word-structure.  I  have 
given  first  (in  tentative  formulation,  of  course) 
a  specific  conclusion  with  supporting  data,  and 
second  a  brief  indication  of  the  reasons  for  main- 
taining the  general  position.  To  deal  with  a 
definite,  if  still  limited,  range  of  fact  before  ap- 
proaching the  wider  theoretical  issues  has  seemed 
to  me  the  better  method,  at  least  for  the  present. 
One  offers  thus  as  first  evidence  the  results  of 
systematic  analysis  and  in  so  far  as  these  possess, 
or  seem  to  possess,  a  certain  solidity  and  co- 
herence within  themselves,  they  are  in  some  sort 
a  guarantee  that  the  underlying  theory  is  worthy 
of  attention. 

May  I  say  that  the  statement  here  given  is  to 
be  regarded  as  nothing  more  formal  or  definitive 
than  a  first  rough  summary  drawn  up  in  order  to 

13 


14  A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS 

open  discussion  and  (if  the  conclusions  indicated 
will  hold  at  all)  to  serve  as  a  basis  for  correction 
and  further  investigation? 


The  position  taken  can  be  outlined  quickly 
and,  for  the  time  being,  with  I  think  fair  ex- 
plicitness  in  the  following  way.  Scansion  iso- 
lates, for  the  sake  of  analysis,  the  basic  metrical 
units  of  verse — feet ;  the  same  analytical  scrutiny 
must,  I  believe,  be  given  to  the  basic  phonetic 
units  of  speech — L  e,,  phonetic  word-forms — be- 
fore we  can  possess  sufficient  data  for  the  study 
of  one  of  the  fundamental  problems  of  verse  as  a 
whole,  the  relation  of  the  word  to  the  foot. 
The  scope  of  the  proposed  analysis  must  evi- 
dently parallel  within  its  own  field  that  of 
scansion  within  the  metrical  field;  that  is,  as  the 
study  of  English  scansion  deals  with  the  whole 
possible  variety  of  metrical  units  in  English 
verse  and  with  the  special  occurrence  of  these  in 
individual  poems,  so  the  study  of  phonetic  word- 
structure  must  deal  with  the  whole  variety  of 
word-forms  existing    in  English  and  with  the 


A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS  15 

comparative  occurrence  of  these  in  specific 
vocabularies. 

Obviously  there  can  be  given,  at  this  time,  in 
support  of  the  position  outlined  but  a  limited 
amount  of  experimental  analysis,  and  as 
obviously,  one  must  select  for  this  first  examina- 
tion and  presentation  a  group  of  facts  which  will 
yield  results  of  main  or  central  significance. 
Accordingly  I  submit  for  immediate  considera- 
tion, as  summarizing  what  seems  to  be  the  most 
important  single  issue  involved,  the  following 
tentative  formulation,  namely — 

That  the  systematic  analysis  of  English  poems 
seems  to  indicate  the  existence  of  a  tendency  to- 
ward distinct  structural  differentiations  of  vocab- 
ulary, the  main  types  being  three  in  number: — 

I.  A  type  of  vocabulary  purely,  or  mainly, 
mono-dissyllabic. 

II.  A  type  showing  medium  structural  com- 
plexity, L  e,j  containing  a  medium  number  of 
words  of  three  syllables  and  over. 

III.  A  type  showing  extreme  structural 
complexity,  i,  e.,  containing  an  extreme  number 
of  words  of  three  syllables  and  over. 

Before  proceeding  to  the  discussion  of  this 


16  A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS 

— ^^— ^^^— ^^—^^^i— — — — — "^—^ ^■^-^™^— — i»^»i— ^— ^■^ 

thesis,  it  is  necessary  to  deal  with  certain  ques- 
tions of  detail — more  especially  with  certain  diffi- 
culties— which  are  bound  to  arise  in  the  actual 
carrying  out  of  the  work. 

In  the  first  place,  even  admitting  it  to  be 
theoretically  desirable,  do  we  possess  to-day  a 
pronunciation  sufficiently  standardized  to  make 
possible  the  analysis  of  vocabularies  on  anything 
like  the  scale  suggested?  Variations  in  pro- 
nunciation are  notorious.  How  can  we  be  as- 
sured that  a  classification  of  the  words  in  any 
given  poem  will  represent  the  pronunciation  of 
the  poet  who  ^Tote?  Is  it  not,  rather,  certain 
that  the  analysis  will  depend  upon  the  pronun- 
ciation of  the  critic  who  dissects,  and  that  the 
results  of  analysis  will,  consequently,  vary  with 
each  new  critic?  And  further,  will  not  the  diffi- 
culties be  hopelessly  increased  when  different  his- 
toric periods  are  to  be  considered?  No  attempt 
is  made  to  minimize  these  difficulties,  nor,  for 
the  present,  to  meet  them  in  detail.  Two  imme- 
diately practical  considerations  are,  however, 
urged. 

First,  as  to  uncertainties  of  pronunciation  per 
se.    Nothing  it  should  be  noted  is  under  present 


A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS  17 

p— "^^^^ ^^^^^^^™^^^— ^^^^^— ^^— — ^^^'— ^^™^^^— — ^""^^^™— ^^ 

examination  except  syllabification  (i.  e.,  the 
number  of  syllables)  ;  possible  differences  of  ac- 
centuation do  not  enter  into  the  matter  at  all. 
Moreover,  since  the  classification  of  vocabularies 
in  question  is  based  on  the  relative  occurrence  of 
words  of  three  syllables  and  over,  only  two  main 
groupings  of  words  are  dealt  with:  the  mono- 
dissyllabic  group  regarded  as  a  whole;  the 
"polysyllabic"  group  regarded  as  a  whole.  As  a 
practical  matter  of  fact,  therefore,  as  far  as  the 
present  investigation  is  concerned,  the  cases  of 
possible  uncertainty  narrow  down  to  the  par- 
ticular group  of  words  where  there  is  a  question 
between  two  and  three  syllables.  I  do  not  think 
that,  however  classified,  the  number  of  words  in 
this  group  is  large  enough  to  affect,  in  any  seri- 
ous way,  the  general  results  obtained. 

Second,  as  to  the  question  of  changing  stand- 
ards of  pronunciation.  Here  again  nothing  is 
urged  beyond  the  reduction  to  a  minimum  of  the 
difficulties  involved — in  this  case  by  selecting  as 
far  as  possible  work  which  allows  the  use  of  what 
may  be  roughly  called  the  present  standard  of 
pronunciation.  The  single  exception  to  this  is 
the  work  of  Milton.    Here  what  may  be  roughly 


18  A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS 

called  the  "Elizabethan"  standard  has  been  used. 
This  statement,  it  is  most  hastily  to  be  said,  im- 
plies no  absurd  assertion  that  one  has  been  able 
to  reconstruct  Elizabethan  pronunciation  as  a 
whole.  For  the  practical  matter  in  hand,  the 
main  concern  is  simply  with  the  fuller  syllabifica- 
tion of  a  perfectly  well-recognized  class  of  words 
— the  ion,  ious,  etc.  class.  In  the  analysis  of 
Milton's  vocabulary  given  below  this  fuller  syl- 
labification has  been  kept  as  consistently  as  pos- 
sible— ocean,  union,  nation,  for  instance,  being 
counted  as  trisyllables.  It  is  to  be  noted,  how- 
ever, that  the  point  made  just  previously  holds 
here  also.  The  results,  as  stated,  would  be  af- 
fected only  by  the  classification  of  those  words 
where  there  is  the  question  of  a  change  from 
three  to  two  syllables. 

One  somewhat  smaller  detail  is  still  to  be  men- 
tioned— the  classification  of  compounds.  The 
rule  followed  has  been  to  regard  compounds  as 
whole  words,  many-fountained,  for  instance,  be- 
ing classed  as  a  word  of  four  syllables.  In  finer 
analysis  it  will,  of  course,  become  necessary  to 
take  into  account  the  extent  to  which  compounds 
are  present  in  the  whole  polysyllabic  group — as 


A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS  19 

r 

it  is  also  necessary  to  take  into  account  the  extent 
to  which  proper  names  are  present. 

Turning  now  to  my  thesis,  I  have  chosen  the 
following  poems  for  first  analysis;  (a)  125 
Nurseiy  Rhymes,  (b)  Paradise  Lost  and  Sam- 
son Agonistes,  (c)  five  of  Pope's  poems  (see 
below).  The  reason  for  this  selection  is  plain 
enough.  If  they  exist  at  all,  we  have  here,  pretty 
clearly,  examples  of  the  three  indicated  types  of 
vocabulary.  It  is  difficult,  at  any  rate,  to  imag- 
ine much  doubt  as  to  the  facts  that  in  Nursery 
Rhymes  there  are  few  "long"  words,  while  Mil- 
ton's is  the  great  example  in  English  verse  of  a 
polysyllabic  vocabulary,  or  probably,  as  to  the 
fact  that  Pope's  vocabulary  would  come  some- 
where between  these  two  extremes.  The  first 
business  in  hand  is,  therefore,  to  see  whether  sys- 
tematic analysis  will  bear  out  this  impression  of 
differentiation  where  it  is  strongest,  and,  if  so, 
what  exacter  arithmetical  values  are  to  be  given 
to  the  words  in  which  the  range  of  difference  has 
so  far  been  expressed.  What,  in  English,  do  we 
more  precisely  mean  by  "few"  or  "more,"  or 
"many"  polysyllables? 


20  A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS 

My  results  for  the  125  Nursery  Rhymes  are  as 
follows:  first,  59  of  the  Rhymes — very  nearly 
half  (47.2%) — are  purely  mono-dissyllabic;  sec- 
ond, taking  the  Rhymes  as  a  whole,  of  the  total 
number  of  words  used  (6,928),  97.86%  belong  to 
the  mono-dissyllabic  group,  2.13%  to  the  poly- 
syllabic group. 

At  the  lowest  extreme  may,  therefore,  be 
placed  an  occurrence  of  polysyllables  running 
from  zero  to  about  2%. 

The  next  section  of  analysis — that  of  Milton 
and  Pope — can  best  be  given  in  tabulated  form. 
(Seep.  21.) 

Summarizing:  the  tables  show  a  characteristic 
occurrence  of  polysyllables  in  Milton's  poems 
running  from  about  7%  to  about  8l/^%,  with  a 
tendency  to  drop  toward  6%  and  to  rise  to  9%, 
and  a  characteristic  occurrence  in  the  poems  by 
Pope  running  from  about  4%  to  about  5%%. 

These  figures  may  be  held,  tentatively,  to  rep- 
resent the  extreme  and  the  medium  occurrence  of 
polysyllables. 


A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS  21 


Table  I. 

Milton 

Total  No. 

Per  cent  Mono- 

Per  cent 

of  words 

dissyllabic 

Polysyllabic 

Paradise  Lost        I 

5,960 

91.67 

8.33 

II 

7,917 

92.24 

7.75 

Ill 

5,56^ 

92.07 

7.92 

IV 

7,700 

92.74 

7.24 

V...... 

6,804 

92.01 

7.99 

VI 

6,773 

90.95 

9.03 

VII 

4,774 

91.40 

8.58 

VIII 

4,921 

91.45 

8.53 

IX 

9,010 

93.01 

6.98 

X 

8,370 

91.74 

8.24 

XI 

6,859 

92.48 

7.50 

XII 

4,930 

91.78 
92.03 

8.21 

Total 

79,584 

7.95 

Samson  Agonistes 

Dialogue 

9,465 

92.04 

7.94 

Choruses 

3,427 

90.92 
91.75 

9.08 

Total 

12,892 

8.23 

Table  II. 


Pope 

Total  No. 

Per  cent  Mono- 

Per  cent 

of  words 

dissyllabic 

Polysyllabic 

Essay  on  Criticism 

5,744 

94.91 

5.08 

The  Rape  of  the  Lock .  . . 

6,149 

94.71 

5.28 

Elegy — Unfortunate  Lady 

652 

95.86 

4.14 

Essay  on  Man     I 

2,288 

94.32 

5.68 

II 

2,251 

94.32 

5.68 

Ill 

2,481 

94.43 

5.56 

IV 

3,141 

95.54 
94.72 

4.46 

Total 

10,161 

5  27 

Epistle  to  Dr.  Arbuthnot 

3,353 

95.91 

4.09 

22  A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS 

Restating  now  the  description  of  the  types  as 
at  first  given  we  have : 

I.  A  type  of  vocabulary  purely,  or  mainly, 
mono-dissyllabic :  i,  e,,  containing  a  characteristic 
occurrence  of  words  of  three  syllables  and  over, 
running  from  0  to  about  2%. 

II.  A  type  of  medium  structural  complex- 
ity :  i.  e,,  containing  a  characteristic  occurrence  of 
words  of  tlii-ee  syllables  and  over,  running  from 
about  4%  to  about  5^%,  with,  probably,  a  ten- 
dency to  drop  towards  3%  and  to  rise  toward 
6%. 

III.  A  type  of  extreme  structural  complex- 
ity: L  e.y  showing  a  characteristic  occurrence  of 
words  of  three  syllables  and  over,  running  from 
about  7%  to  about  8^%,  with  a  tendency  to 
drop  towards  6%  and  to  rise  to  9%. 

The  next  step  is  to  see  how  far  the  scheme  thus 
roughly  established  can  be  applied  with  reference 
to  the  vocabularies  of  other  poems.  Here  selec- 
tion has  been  made — always  the  selection  of 
whole  poems — from  the  work  of  Tennyson, 
Swinburne,  Francis  Thompson  and  Mr.  Maurice 
Hewlett.  The  results  of  analysis  are  given  in 
tabulated  form. 


A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS  23 


Table  III. 


Tennyson 


Total  No. 
of  words 


Per  cent  Mono- 
dissyllabic 


Per  cent 
Polysyllabic 


Oenone 

Ulysses 

Tithonus 

The  Coming  of  Arthur, 
Merlin  and  Vivien  .  .  . . 
Lancelot  and  Elaine . . . 

The  Holy  Grail 

Guinevere 

The  Passing  of  Arthur, 


1,988 

556 

599 

4,256 

7,896 

11,799 

7,474 

5,671 

3,855 


94.31 
96.94 
96.33 
96.54 
95.88 
95.83 
96.48 
95.68 
96.59 


5.68 
3.05 
3.67 
3.45 
4.10 


15 
50 
30 
39 


Table  IV. 


Swinburne 


Total  No. 
of  words 


Per  cent  Mono- 
dissyllabic 


Per  cent 
Polysyllabic 


Chastelard      I ......  . 

II 

Ill 

IV 

V 

Total 

Atalanta  in  Calydon 

Dialogue 

Choruses 

Total 

Hymn  to  Proserpine. . 

Hesperia 

The  Forsaken  Garden 


4,712 
3,975 
3,703 
7,061 
6,001 

25,452 


12,832 
5,536 

18,368 

1,003 

1,283 

671 


98.59 
98.56 
98.65 
98.30 
98.18 

98.42 


95.84 
96.83 

96.14 

97.50 
97.03 
98.80 


1.40 
1.43 
1.35 
1.68 
1.81 

1.57 


14 
17 


3.85 

2.49 
2.96 
1.19 


24  A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS 


Table  V. 


Francis  Thompson 


Total  No. 
of  words 


Per  cent  Mono- 
dissyllabic 


Per  cent 
Polysyllabic 


The  Hound  of  Heaven . 
An  Anthem  of  Earth  . . 


Sister  Songs    I . 
II 


Total 


1,205 

2,798 

2,658 
5,457 

8,115 


92.61 
90.59 

92.02 
92.11 

92.06 


7.38 
9.39 

7.97 
7.89 

7.92 


Table  VI. 

Maurice  Hewlett 

Total  No. 
of  words 

Per  cent  Mono- 
dissyllabic 

Per  cent 
Polysyllabic 

Minos,  King  of  Crete .... 

Ariadne  in  Naxos 

Death  of  Hippolytus .... 

7,882 
8,325 
8,080 

96.41 
95.92 
95.96 

3.59 
4.07 
4.03 

It  is  clear  that  these  vocabularies  fall  readily 
into  the  suggested  classification. 

In  the  work  of  Tennyson  the  vocabulary  used 
is  of  the  "medium"  type,  but  it  is  to  be  remarked 
that  while  in  the  poems  of  Pope  under  analysis 
the  tendency  is  to  rise  from  4%  toward  5%,  there 
is  here  a  tendency  to  drop  from  4%  toward  S%. 

Also  of  the  medium  type,  "Atalanta  in  Caly- 
don"  shows  the  same  tendency,  while  the  *'Hymn 
to  Proserpine"  and  "Hesperia"  drop  still  fur- 
ther, from  3%  towards  2%.     In  "Chastelard" 


A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS  25 

and  "The  Forsaken  Garden"  the  occurrence, 
under  2%,  is  that  of  the  first  type.  The  use  of 
so  markedly  mono-dissyllabic  a  vocabulary  is,  of 
course,  particularly  to  be  noted  in  a  poem  of  the 
length  of  "Chastelard." 

The  work  of  Francis  Thompson,  without  any 
analysis  easily  to  be  recognized  as  of  the  "ex- 
treme" polysyllabic  type,  shows,  under  analysis, 
in  the  three  poems  chosen,  the  characteristic  oc- 
currences derived  from  Milton — 7%  to  99^. 

Mr.  Maurice  Hewlett,  on  the  other  hand,  uses 
in  his  trilogy,  "The  Agonists,"  the  medium  type 
of  vocabulary,  with,  as  in  the  case  of  Tennyson, 
the  3-4%  occurrence  rather  than  the  4-5%  ex- 
emplified by  Pope. 

Thus  the  only  changes  to  be  made  as  the  result 
of  this  section  of  analysis  are  to  give  2%  as  the 
lower  limit  of  polysyllabic  occurrence  for  the 
medium  type  of  vocabulary  and  to  indicate  a 
slight  tendency  to  rise  above  9%  in  the  extreme 
type,  taking  9^%  (or,  perhaps,  even  10%?)  as 
the  experimental  upper  limit. 

I  can  carry  the  direct  demonstration  of  my 
thesis  no  farther  at  present.     It  remains  in  this 


26  A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS 

direction  but  to  continue  analysis,  working  at  the 
two  main  groupings  of  words  here  given  and,  at 
the  resokition  of  these  into  their  finer  sub- 
divisions, establishing  the  percentages  of  sepa- 
rate occurrence  for  the  main  classes  of  words 
(monosyllables,  dissyllables,  trisyllables,  etc.) 
and  within  each  of  these  main  classes  as  a  whole, 
the  percentage  occurrence  of  their  respective  ac- 
centual sub-types.  This  detailed  analysis  will 
give  (as  that  already  submitted  for  the  larger 
groupings)  exacter  information  as  to  total  range 
of  occurrence  and  as  to  comparative  occurrence 
in  specific  vocabularies. 

But  continuance  of  analysis  without  pausing 
to  consider  the  many  delicate  and  controversial 
questions  involved  would  be  unprofitable  and  it 
would  be,  I  think,  unsatisfactory,  even  apart 
from  these  difficulties,  to  present  further  ac- 
cumulations of  fact  without  meeting  directly  the 
cardinal  issue  of  their  prosodic  application.  To 
this  issue  I  therefore  turn  in  the  second  part  of 
my  exposition. 

May  I  however  at  this  juncture  make  some 
brief  and  informal  comment  on  points  connected 
not  with  the  prosodic  application  but  with  the 


A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS  27 

purely  linguistic  interest  of  the  matters  just  pre- 
sented? So  far  as  I  know  the  analysis  covers 
new  ground  and  I  naturally  find  myself  wonder- 
ing to  what  extent  the  facts  revealed  may  seem 
in  and  of  themselves  important — whether,  that  is, 
the  suggestion  that  such  differentiations  of  vo- 
cabulary may  exist  will  arrest  attention  as  rais- 
ing a  question  of  genuine  significance  in  regard 
to  English  and  whether  it  seems  more  useful  to 
express  the  total  and  comparative  occurrences  of 
the  various  word-forms  in  definite  arithmetical 
values  rather  than  in  the  vague  terms  of  few, 
more  and  many.  It  may  be  that  such  data  as  this 
would  be  valuable  in  tracing  the  historic  develop- 
ment of  English  and  in  establishing  comparisons 
between  English  and  the  "more"  polysyllabic 
languages  ? 

That  the  few  polysyllables  of  English  are  lit- 
erally so  few  surprised  me.  I  had  expected  (or 
since  I  was  surprised  I  suppose  I  had  expected) 
a  generally  higher  percentage  of  occurrence. 
The  marked  stability  of  the  various  occurrences 
surprised  me,  too;  I  had  expected  rather  wider 
fluctuations. 


II 

The  task  of  formulating  a  single  proposition 
and  presenting  facts  in  evidence  now  gives  way 
to  the  more  intricate  business  of  showing  this 
proposition  not  in  isolation  but  as  part  of  a  con- 
sistent theory  of  English  verse-structure  as  a 
whole.  That  I  give  the  merest  first  sketch  of 
such  inclusive  formulation  has  already  been 
stated  and  is  surely  too  obvious  to  need  repeti- 
tion, but  I  should  like  to  add  that,  acutely  aware 
at  once  of  the  difficulties  involved  and  of  my  own 
but  slender  competence,  I  mean  to  go  no  further 
in  the  unavoidable  generalizations  than  is  neces- 
sary in  order  to  indicate  the  connections  which  I 
think  it  may  be  possible  to  establish.  My  dis- 
cussion moreover  will  be  cast  as  little  as  possible 
in  terms  of  pure  theory  and  as  much  as  possible 
in  terms  of  technique.  And,  finally,  it  may  be 
well  to  say  at  once  that  small  emphasis  is  put 
upon  any  matter  of  novelty,  that  in  fact,  as  will 
in  a  moment  appear,  it  is  for  the  most  part  the 
quite  contrary  point  which  is  insisted  upon. 

29 


30  A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS 

It  will  make  probably  for  greater  clearness 
and  economy  if  I  work  again  from  the  central 
point  of  a  single  sharply  formulated  thesis.  I 
submit  therefore  the  following,  namely: — 

That  no  prosodic  theory  is  adequate  which 
fails  explicitly  to  recognize  within  verse-struc- 
ture as  a  whole  a  complex  of  three  inter-existent 
structures:  1,  the  verse- form  proper,  itself  two- 
fold, consisting  of  (a)  the  rhythmic  arrangement 
and  (b)  the  syllabic  aiTangement  by  means  of 
which  the  rhythm  is  exteriorized;  and  2,  the 
sub-structural  phonetic  speech-arrangement. 

By  the  phonetic  sub-structure  I  mean,  finally, 
everything  connected  with  the  organized  physi- 
cal material  of  language;  but  attention  in  the 
present  discussion  is  sharply  focused  on  the 
word,  which,  I  would  contend,  is  in  its  phonetic 
aspect  the  basic  structural  unit  of  language  phys- 
ically considered  as  the  foot  is  the  basic  struc- 
tural unit  of  the  verse-form  proper. 

The  discussion  will  fall  into  two  parts:  first, 
as  preliminary,  a  rapid  consideration  of  the  ex- 
tent to  which  English  prosodic  theory  has  so  far 
tended  to  recognize,  either  as  a  whole  or  in  part, 
the  principles  here  stated;  and,  second,  a  state- 


A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS  31 

merit  of  the  more  important  points  in  technique 
which,  if  correctly  observed,  seem  to  force  the 
acceptance  of  the  thesis,  again  in  the  end,  as  a 
whole,  but  with  a  present  emphasis  on  the  valid- 
ity of  the  last  term. 

(1) 

In  considering  the  first  point,  I  must  more 
than  ever  deal  in  makeshift  discussion  since  its 
adequate  treatment  would  require,  what  I  by  no 
means  possess,  a  thorough-going  knowledge  of 
the  historical  development  of  English  prosodic 
theory.  Rather  however  than  leave  (the  only 
alternative)  an  absolute  gap  in  my  argument,  I 
give  for  what  it  is  worth  the  following  roughly 
generalized  statement  of  what  seems  to  emerge 
as  a  coherent  line  of  development.  It  will  serve 
at  any  rate  to  recognize  the  fact  that  the  ability 
to  demonstrate  the  steady  convergence  of  theo- 
retical speculation  toward  it  as  a  common  con- 
clusion will  be  an  important  factor  in  the  estab- 
lishment of  any  final  synthesis. 

At  the  beginning  of  the  sequence,  then,  as  I 
see  it,  are  to  be  considered  the  prosodists  who 
think  of  verse  as   a  simple  uncomplex  whole. 


32  A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS 

Among  these  are  most  of  the  earlier  and  a  scat- 
tering of  the  later  men.  Professor  Saintsbury  is 
(I  think)  the  main  present  exponent  of  a  theory 
based  upon  any  such  unanalyzed  reaction.  It  is 
also  significant  to  note  that  we  have  here  the 
average  layman's  view  of  the  matter.  In  this 
stage  of  introspective  observation  conscious  at- 
tention seems  to  be  focused  on  the  arrangement 
of  syllables  by  means  of  which  the  rhythm  is  ex- 
teriorized (the  b  term  of  my  thesis). 

Such  simplification  has,  in  the  main,  given  way 
to  conscious  awareness  of  the  differentiated 
rhythmic  arrangement  and  I  think  it  would 
probably  be  safe  to  say  that  many  present-day 
metrists  tend  to  recognize  the  twofold  character 
of  the  verse-form  proper  (the  co-existent  a-b 
terms  of  my  thesis).  The  development  of  this 
awareness  of  the  rhythmic  factor  per  se^  signal- 
ized (I  suppose?)  by  the  appearance  of  the  ''mu- 
sical" and  "temporal"  scansionists,  may  be  said 
to  mark  the  second  stage  in  introspective  analy- 
sis, what  had  seemed  to  be  an  uncomplex  whole 
now  revealing  itself  as  a  complex  entity  contain- 
ing within  itself  two  inter-existent  entities. 

It  is  not  to  be  expected,  however,  that  the  new 


A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS  33 

theoretical  formulation  conditioned  by  the  ad- 
vance in  accuracy  of  observation  should  be  im- 
mediately achieved.  There  is  especially  to  be 
reckoned  with,  as  one  would  expect,  a  tendency 
to  throw  very  great  emphasis  on  the  newly  ob- 
served factor,  rhythm,  and  where  this  is  carried 
to  the  extent  of  a  decided  over-emphasis  an  im- 
portant result  follows — the  failure,  namely, 
properly  to  correlate  the  manifestation  of 
rhythm  under  consideration  with  its  specialized 
medium,  in  this  case,  language.  Such  failure  is 
probably  to  be  regarded  as  the  vitiating  flaw  in 
the  theories  of  the  musical  scansionists  and,  it 
follows,  of  their  method  which  is  based  on  an 
attempt  to  transfer  the  terms  and  notation  de- 
veloped in  relation  to  the  manifestations  of 
rhythm  in  one  material  to  its  manifestations  in  a 
different  material.  It  is  also  to  be  noted  that 
where  over-emphasis  on  the  rhythmic  factor 
exists  in  any  marked  degree  it  results,  naturally, 
in  reversion  toward  the  primitive  view  of  verse 
as  an  uncomplex  whole,  but  with  conscious  atten- 
tion now  shifted  to  focus  on  the  rhythmic 
arrangement  (the  a  term  of  my  thesis).  The 
treatment  which  (so  far  as  my  knowledge  goes) 


34  A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS 

shows  least  any  such  deflection  of  emphasis  is 
that  of  Mr.  T.  S.  Omond.  Mr.  Omond,  if  I 
understand  him,  while  differentiating  sharply 
between  the  rhythmic  arrangement  and  the 
manifesting  syllabic  structure,  indicates  with 
equal  clearness  their  proper  condition  of  inter- 
existence  within  the  verse-form  as  a  unit. 

Nor,  further,  is  it  to  be  expected  that  the  more 
complex  methods  necessitated  by  the  advance  in 
theory  should  be  immediately  perfected.  As  a 
matter  of  fact  the  crucial  change  in  method  in- 
herent in  the  new  theoretical  standpoint  would 
not  be  immediately  apparent  and  one  of  the  most 
important  achievements  of  recent  prosodic  study 
has  been,  I  should  say,  to  discover  and  state  this 
change.  The  desideratum  is,  clearly,  a  method 
allowing  the  close  study  of  the  rhythmic  groups 
of  verse,  the  "musical"  scansion  just  mentioned 
being  an  attempt  to  meet  this  need.  What  has 
now  become  apparent  is  that  we  soon  reach  here 
the  limits  of  possible  analysis  based  on  simple  ob- 
servation "by  ear"  or  by  our  "sense  of"  rhythm. 
The  delicate  and  accurate  study  of  the  rhythmic 
groups  of  verse  must,  it  is  seen,  be  carried  on  by 
means  of  laboratory  experiment.     This  issue  as 


A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS  35 


to  method,  the  importance  of  which  it  seems  to 
me    impossible    to    exaggerate,    has    now    been 
definitely  raised,  more  especially,  whatever  one 
may  think  of  his  conclusions,  by  M.  Paul  Ver- 
rier.    As  a  result  it  is  no  longer  possible  to  dis- 
cuss except  on  the  basis   of  relevant  evidence 
gathered     by     genuinely     scientific     laboratory 
analysis   such   fundamental   questions   of  verse- 
structure   as   the   isochronism    of   the   rhythmic 
groups  or — the   crux  of  the  whole  matter — the 
fundamental  difference  between  prose  and  verse. 
It  is  to  be  noted  that  in  thus  correlating  the  prob- 
lem of  rhythm  in  verse  with  the  whole  rhythmic 
problem  there  is  necessitated,    since   a  speech- 
group  is  concerned,  making  relevant  questions  of 
syllabic  length  and  the  nature  and  function  of 
accent,     a    first     application    of    experimental 
phonetics  to  prosodic  study. 

Two  stages  in  what  may  be  at  least  reasonably 
suggested  as  a  coherent  sequence  in  the  develop- 
ment of  English  prosodic  theory  have  now  been 
indicated.  Awareness  of  verse-structure  in 
terms  of  a  naive  simplification  gives  way  to 
growing  awareness  of  its  real  complexity.  The 
increased  accuracy  of  observation    conditions  a 


36  A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS 

change  in  theoretical  formulation  and  as  obser- 
vation and  theory  grow  more  precise  they  neces- 
sitate commensurate  advance  in  precision  of 
method.  It  is  now  the  logically  sequent  step  in 
my  argument  to  maintain  that  continued  intro- 
spective analysis  of  our  reaction  to  verse-struc- 
ture as  a  whole  will  next  result  in  conscious 
awareness  of  the  existence  within  it  of  the  sub- 
structural  speech-arrangement  (the  2,  of  my 
thesis). 

I  give  in  briefest  sunmiary  three  points  which 
may  not  unreasonably  be  regarded  as  indicating 
this  to  be  in  fact  the  case. 

(a)  There  is  discernible  in  some  recent  dis- 
cussions of  English  verse  a  growing  reluctance 
to  admit  any  differentiated  verse  values  as  neces- 
sary in  accounting  for  verse-structure.  This  atti- 
tude shows  itself  markedly  in,  for  instance,  the 
discussion  of  "accent"  or  "stress"  where  an  im- 
portant controversial  question  is  that  relating  to 
the  use  in  verse  of  syllables  carrying  secondary 
word-accent  and  of  certain  grammatical  classes 
of  words,  conjunctions,  prepositions,  etc.  The 
''Rules  of  Stress  Rhythm"  formulated  by  Mr. 
Robert   Bridges   give   clear   expression   to   the 


A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS  37 

^^^^''""""*'''^^™'''''"''"^™'™''^''^'''™"™™'"'"™'''''^'^*'^~"^^'™"'""^~™'*''''™'"™ 

opinion  denying  these  any  value  in  verse  other 
than  their  "natural  speech"  value: — e,  g..  Rule 
II  "The  stresses  must  all  be  true  speech- 
stresses,"  and  Rule  IV  "A  stress  has  a  peculiarly 
strong  attraction  for  its  own  proclitics  and  en- 
clitics." {Milton  s  Prosody,  p.  91,  p.  93.)  The 
same  view  is  implicit  in  Mr.  Maurice  Hewlett's 
introductory  note  explaining  the  versification  of 
The  Agonists,  "Now  all  I  ask  of  mine  [my 
hearers]  is  that  the  verse  be  read  to  them  as 
prose,  with  the  stresses  where  they  would  nat- 
urally fall,  and  full  value  given  to  the  vowel 
sounds  of  ordinary  speech.  If  this  rule  be  ob- 
served, and  the  indicated  pauses  followed,  the 
three  plays  ought  to  be  revealed  as  verse"  (The 
Agonists,  pp.  X-XI). 

The  attitude  expressed  in  these  statements  is, 
I  would  submit,  normally  to  be  expected  at  the 
present  stage  in  the  development  of  English 
prosodic  theory.  It  signalizes  growing  aware- 
ness of  the  speech-arrangement  per  se,  manifest- 
ing at  the  same  time  exactly  the  over-emphasis 
on  this  arrangement  which  would  naturally  ac- 
company its  first  conscious  perception.  The 
effect  of  such  over-emphasis  is  seen  in  the  in- 


38  A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS 

clination  either  to  reduce  the  whole  verse-struc- 
ture to  the  speech-arrangement  alone,  thus  re- 
verting towards  the  primitive  view  of  verse  as  an 
uncomplex  whole,  or  to  suppress  the  middle  term 
(any  differentiated  syllabic  arrangement,  that 
is)  the  speech-arrangement  being  regarded  as 
itself  externalizing  the  rhythm. 

(b)  Other  recent  discussions,  on  the  contrary, 
recognize  with  varying  degrees  of  explicitness 
what  is  often  called  the  "contrast"  of  speech-  and 
verse-units,  or  their  "non-coincidence."  In  anv 
statement  of  this  kind  recognition  of  the  dif- 
ferentiated speech-arrangement  is  so  clearly 
made  that  it  is  difficult  to  give  it  distincter  ex- 
pression. When,  for  instance.  Sir  Walter  Ra- 
leigh writes  of  Milton — "His  chief  study,  it  will 
be  found,  is  to  varv  the  word  in  relation  to  the 
foot,  and  the  sentence  in  relation  to  the  line" 
{Milton,  p.  199) — he  recognizes  the  co-existence 
within  the  whole  of  the  verse-form  proper  and 
the  substructural  speech-arrangement  and,  not 
only  this,  but  he  recognizes  specifically,  in  the 
first  clause,  what  I  have  indicated  as  seeming  to 
me  the  primary  structural  point,  the  relation  of 
the  foot  to  the  word.    In  this  connection  I  would 


A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  3IETRICS  39 

further,  and  especially,  point  out  the  importance 
of  Professor  Saintsbury's  insistence  on  the  "non- 
coincidence"  of  verse-  and  speech-units,  particu- 
larly (again  in  specific  recognition)  of  the  foot 
and  word.  I  have  not  made  a  detailed  examina- 
tion of  Professor  Saintsbury's  prosodic  state- 
ment, but  I  am  inclined  at  least  to  wonder 
whether  when  in  its  final  evaluation  this  is  done, 
his  constantly  increasing  emphasis  on  just  this 
point  of  the  non-coincidence  of  foot-  and  word- 
division  will  not  emerge  as  a  feature  of  outstand- 
ing significance.  The  first  direct  statement  of  it 
(that  I  noticed  at  least)  is  in  a  foot-note — "I 
think  it  is  a  mistake  to  try  to  make  foot-  corre- 
spond with  word-division:  the  best  metre  is  often 
that  which  divides  the  words  most"  {History  of 
English  Prosody,  I,  p.  387).  In  the  second  and 
third  volumes  the  point  is  increasingly  insisted 
on,  whether  directly  or  by  implication,  reaching 
in  the  third  volume  the  clear-cut  assertion  that 
".  .  .  in  poetry  except  in  so  far  as  our  abun- 
dant monosyllables  prevent  it  we  positively 
avoid,  save  for  special  reasons,  coincidence  of 
foot-  and  word-end"  {ibid..  Vol.  Ill,  p.  456). 
And  now  in  the  recently  issued  History  of  Prose 


40  A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS 

Rhythm  Professor  Saint sbury  is  almost  ready  to 
see  in  this  fact  of  non-coincidence  one  of  the 
fundamental  differences  between  prose  and 
verse,  smnmarizing  the  view  thus  in  his  table  of 
axioms  and  inferences:  "There  is  no  objection 
to  the  falling  of  a  foot-end  in  the  middle  of  a 
word.  But  it  is  less  frequent  in  prose  than  in 
verse;  and  its  comparative  rarity  perhaps  fur- 
nishes one  of  the  diiFerences  between  prose-  and 
verse-rhythm"  {History  of  English  Prose 
Rhythm,  1^,  479,  IF  9). 

In  such  recognitions  of  "contrast"  or  ''non- 
coincidence"  as  these  quoted  from  Professor 
Raleigh  and  Professor  Saintsbury  there  is,  again 
I  would  submit,  a  variant  attitude  which  would 
normally  occur,  along  with  the  one  previously 
noted,  at  the  present  stage  of  development  in 
English  prosodic  theory.  We  have  here  a  clear 
awareness  of  the  co-existent  speech-  and  verse- 
arrangements  within  verse  as  a  whole,  an  aware- 
ness acute  moreover  at  the  primary  point,  the  re- 
lation of  the  two  basic  units  concerned,  the  foot 
and  the  word;  but  the  full  theoretical  implication 
of  the  observed  fact  is  not  discerned  and  there  is 
consequently   no   generalized   theoretical   state- 


A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS  41 


merit  of  it.  In  this  stage  there  is  evidenced  that 
curious  condition  of  seeing  and  not  seeing  which, 
however  difficult  to  describe  or  account  for,  is 
nevertheless  as  a  psychological  condition  easily 
recognizable. 

(c)  And,  third,  it  is  possible  to  give  at  least 
one  instance  (there  may  be  more)  of  the  formu- 
lation which  would  naturally  follow  the  one  just 
described:  a  formulation,  that  is,  in  which  the 
fact  of  the  inter-existence  within  verse  as  a  whole 
of  the  verse-  and  speech-arrangements  is  not  only 
observed  but  given  its  generalized  theoretical 
value.  I  quote  from  Mr.  Thomas  Rudmose- 
Brown:  "When  M.  Verrier  retorts  .  .  .  . 
that  'Phonetics  divides  ...  in  accordance 
with  what  we  hear'  and  that  metrics  cannot  di- 
vide otherwise  on  pain  of  being  but  'arbitrary 
dogmatism'  he  ignores  what  is  fundamental  in 
all  metrical  investigation,  namely  that  a  line  of 
verse  is  a  portion  of  speech-material  with  all  its 
phonetic  features  (corresponding  to  its  ethos  as 
well  as  its  logos )  adjusted,  without  violence,  to  a 
fixed  and  definite  metrical  scheme.  The  two  en- 
tities, metrical  scheme  and  portion  of  speech- 
material  adjusted  thereto,  are  distinct  and  the 


42  A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS 

chief  study  of  the  metricist  is  the  manner  of  ad- 
justment of  the  latter  to  the  former,  the  way  in 
which  a  suitable  portion  of  phonetic  liquid  is 
chosen  and  poured  into  metrical  bottles"  {Eng- 
lish and  French  Metric,  Modern  Language  Re- 
view, Jan.,  1913,  p.  104) .  I  do  not  know  to  what 
extent  Mr.  Rudmose-Brown  develops  the  state- 
ment here  made  in  his  general  treatment  of 
metrics  (the  matter  is  complicated  by  his  postu- 
lation  of  two  different  basic  principles  as  opera- 
tive in  English  verse)  but  this  is,  as  far  as  it  goes, 
clear  enough  to  serve  fairly,  I  think,  as  evidence 
in  the  matter  at  issue. 

For  these  reasons,  then,  it  seems  to  me  that  it 
may  be  possible  to  correlate  present  analyses  of 
verse-structure  with  the  sequence  in  development 
experimentally  postulated  for  English  prosodic 
theory  as  a  whole.  We  find,  to  recapitulate,  in 
considering  these  analyses  in  relation  to  the  as- 
sumed next  step  in  that  development,  i.  e.,  grow- 
ing awareness  of  the  sub-structural  speech- 
arrangement  as  existent  within  verse-structure 
as  a  whole: — (a)  statements  conditioned  by  so 
keen  an  awareness  of  this  arrangement,  in  its 
first  conscious  perception,  that  it  obliterates  or 


A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METEICS  43 

obscures  conscious  awareness  of  the  other  in- 
cluded arrangements:  (b)  statements  condi- 
tioned by  an  awareness  which  extends  to  recog- 
nition of  the  fact  of  the  inter-existence  of  the 
verse-  and  speech-arrangements  but  which  stop 
short  of  any  clearly  generalized  perception  of  the 
theoretical  implications  of  the  fact:  (c)  a  state- 
ment which,  conditioned  by  such  generalized  per- 
ception, gives  generalized  theoretical  formula- 
tion. These  statements,  taken  together,  show, 
I  would  now  submit,  the  third  main  stage  in  the 
postulated  sequence  to  be  in  process  of  accom- 
plishment, and  it  is  clear  that  a  main  justification 
of  the  present  discussion  would  rest  upon  the 
assumption  that  it  represents  the  next  step  in 
this  process,  i.  e.,  the  step  necessitated  by  the  fact 
that  generalized  theoretical  formulation  is  not 
really  complete  until  it  is  accompanied  by  a  fully 
conscious  awareness  of  the  necessary  implica- 
tions as  to  method.  It  is  this  issue  as  to  method 
which  is  here  definitely  raised,  and  I  would  in- 
sist that  if  the  position  taken  will  hold  at  all,  it 
holds  as  part  of  it  that  we  have  now  reached  in 
relation  to  the  third  main  advance  in  correct  ob- 
servation, as  already  in  relation  to  the  second,  a 


44  A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS 

place  where  the  issue  as  to  method  becomes  a 
crucial  one.  The  desideratum  in  this  case  is  a 
method  allowing  that  close  study  of  the  sub- 
structural  speech-arrangement  which  is  neces- 
sary to  a  proper  understanding  of  the  co-existent 
verse-arrangement.  Such  methodical  investiga- 
tion must,  I  would  contend,  begin  at  the  basic 
point,  the  relation  of  the  foot  to  the  word  and 
this  brings  me,  in  theoretical  approach,  to  my 
initial,  and  central,  suggestion — that  an  impor- 
tant application  of  phonetics  to  metrical  prob- 
lems lies  in  the  study  of  phonetic  word-structure 
(see  p.  1)  since  it  is  only  by  means  of  such  study 
that  we  can  obtain  the  requisite  information  as  to 
the  principles  of  phonetic  word-structure,  the 
varieties  (in  their  inherent  classification)  of 
English  phonetic  word-forms  and  their  compara- 
tive occurrences.  I  have  in  the  analysis  already 
submitted,  put  this  suggestion  into  experimental 
operation  using  the  method  advocated,  not  to 
present  a  new  point,  but  to  test  certain  basic  dif- 
ferences in  vocabularies  of  which  we  seem  to  get 
clear  and  unmistakable  first  report  ''by  ear." 
The  results  obtained  tend,  it  has  been  seen,  to 
verify  this  impression,  but  while  the  first  un- 


A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS  45 

tested  report  gives  us  information  in  vague  terms 
and  is  even  within  these  limits  generally  satis- 
factory only  where  extremes  are  concerned — 
where  we  have  to  distinguish,  that  is,  between 
an  unmistakably  mono-dissyllabic  and  an  un- 
mistakably polysyllabic  vocabulary — systematic 
analysis  not  only  translates  vague  into  determin- 
ate arithmetic  values  but  allows  the  tracing  of 
intermediate  gradations  with  a  precision  and 
delicacy  otherwise  impossible. 

Is  it  necessary  to  say  that  one  is  of  course  all 
the  time  working  "by  ear" — but  by  a  reasoned 
and  tested  hearing? 

(2) 

It  remains  to  indicate  how  the  study  of  word- 
structure  can  be  considered  to  have  direct  bear- 
ing on  specific  problems  of  verse-technique. 
There  has  been,  of  course,  throughout  the  whole 
discussion  implicit  general  assumption  that  such 
direct  bearing  exists,  for  if  we  recognize  "by 
ear"  the  varying  of  the  word  in  relation  to  the 
foot,  or  structural  differences  in  vocabularies,  it 
is  because  these  as  basic  conditions  are  perceived 
by  us  in  terms  of  total  final  effect.    The  present 


46  A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS 

infinitely  difficult  and  elusive  problem  is  to  re- 
solve the  whole  generalized  observation  into  its 
component  detail.  Again  it  is  necessary  to  write 
selectively,  choosing  only  what  has  main  signifi- 
cance and  presenting  not  full  discussion  but  con- 
densed outline. 

Perhaps  it  may  be  as  well  to  give  first,  with 
momentary  disconnection  from  the  central  thesis, 
such  part  of  the  matter  as  can  be  considered  with 
little  or  no  reference  to  any  particular  theory. 

To  begin  with,  then,  it  is  to  be  noted  that 
where  a  mono-dissyllabic  vocabulary  is  used  the 
completed  arrangement  is  constructed,  entirely 
or  almost  entirely,  of  combinations  of  two  main 
phonetic  word-forms,  one  of  these  the  dissyllabic, 
existing  in  two  sub-forms.  With  the  introduc- 
tion of  polysyllables  the  number  of  different  ele- 
mentary word-forms  increases,  the  completed  ar- 
rangement being  composed  of  combinations  not 
of  two,  but  of  three,  four,  five  or  more  main 
word-forms  with  the  corresponding  increase  in 
the  number  of  sub-forms.  There  is  then  to  be 
considered  in  a  polysyllabic  as  opposed  to  a 
mono-dissyllabic  vocabulary  an  increase  in  the 
variety  of  elementary  word-forms  entering  into 


A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS  47 


combination  to  form  the  completed  arrangement. 

A  main  distinction  between  the  "shorter"  and 
''longer"  word-forms — the  distinction  which 
justifies  their  division  into  two  main  groups — 
lies  in  the  fact  that  the  longer  word  necessitates 
for  its  construction  the  use  of  a  second  accentual 
value,  secondary  word-accent.  With  the  in- 
creased variety  in  word-forms  found  in  the  poly- 
syllabic vocabulary  there  is,  then,  also  to  be  con- 
sidered the  introduction  of  this  further  value  in 
word-accent. 

A  third  point  in  connection  with  the  introduc- 
tion of  polysyllables  seems  to  me  of  great  and 
perhaps  not  always  fully  realized  importance; 
its  effect,  I  mean,  on  the  problem  of  what  for 
lack  of  a  better  term  may  be  called  the  problem 
of  weighting.  The  English  monosyllable  is  in 
general  a  "full"  or  "heavy"  syllable;  polysyl- 
lables contain  usually  one  or  more  "light"  syl- 
lables. When  therefore  a  vocabulary  contains  a 
very  high  percentage  of  monosyllables  it  tends, 
roughly  speaking,  to  be  in  a  consistent  condition 
of  heavy  weighting;  with  an  increase,  in  dissyl- 
lables as  well,  but  more  especially  of  polysyl- 
lables, the  number  of  light  syllables  increases  and 


48  A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS 

when  these  reach  a  sufficiently  high  occurrence 
the  significant  fact  to  notice  is  that  the  vocabu- 
lary containing,  as  always  in  English,  a  large 
number  of  heavy  syllables,  combines  with  these 
an  appreciable  number  of  syllables  in  the  oppo- 
site condition  of  lightness. 

This  I  state  with  reference  to  the  present  pro- 
nunciation of  English.  The  problem  of  weight- 
ing, I  may  note,  seems  to  have  been  most  ex- 
plicitly discussed  in  connection  with  the  changed 
condition  in  the  language  resulting  from  the  loss 
of  the  final  e.  That  this  meant  not  only  a  struc- 
tural change  as  altering  in  many  words  the  num- 
ber of  their  syllables,  but  that  it  also,  owing  to 
the  complete  disappearance  of  so  large  a  number 
of  light  syllables,  brought  about  a  general 
change  in  weighting  throughout  the  language  is 
commonly  recognized,  together  with  the  special 
effect  of  this  latter  change  on  Milton's  technical 
problem  as  compared  with  Chaucer's.  I  have 
been,  to  add  a  related  comment,  puzzled  over  the 
fact  that  while  the  final  e  and  its  vanishment 
have  been,  as  all  the  world  knows,  so  thoroughly 
dealt  with,  an  analogous  change  from  Eliza- 
bethan (or  Tudor)  pronunciation  to  our  own  has 


A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS  49 


been  left,  naturally  not  unnoticed,  but  rather 
strikingly  undiscussed,  at  any  rate  in  its  prosodic 
connection.  This  change,  affecting  words  in  ion, 
ious,  etc.  (see  p.  18),  resulted,  as  did  the  loss  of 
the  e,  in  the  shortening  of  many  words  by  one 
syllable  and  in  the  consequent  total  loss  of  a 
large  number  of  light  syllables;  moreover,  since 
these  syllables  occurred  always  within  the  word, 
the  resultant  change  in  its  flexibility  is  even 
greater;  and  finally,  what  did  not  at  all  follow 
the  loss  of  the  e^  there  results  in  this  case  a 
marked  increase  in  the  occurrence  of  certain  con- 
sonantal sounds,  notably  sh.  It  needs  but  to 
mention  as  example  the  Cherub  Contemplation. 
Keightley,  noting  his  usage  in  regard  to  Hebrew 
and  Classical  proper  names,  says  that  Milton 
"abhorred  sh"  (Geightley,  Life^  Opinions  and 
Writings  of  John  Milton,  London,  1859,  p.  439, 
p.  448). 

However  detail  must  wait  for  later  discussion. 
The  main  conditions  involved,  here  not  much 
more  than  enumerated,  are  ( 1 )  the  total  number 
of  word-forms  entering  into  combination  to  form 
the  completed  arrangement  (2)  the  range  of 
values  in  word-accent  (3)  general  conditions  of 


50  A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS 

weighting.  The  question,  irrespective  of  theory, 
is  whether  these  conditions  tend  to  force  them- 
selves on  one's  observation  as  significant  condi- 
tions within  the  medium.  The  discussion  already 
given  goes  to  show  that  there  is  an  increasing 
tendency  to  note  just  such  conditions  and,  as  a 
matter  of  fact,  it  would,  I  suppose,  be  agreed 
without  any  discussion  that  the  particular  obser- 
vations enumerated  present  in  themselves  noth- 
ing new.  The  argument  flows  not  from  assump- 
tion of  novelty  but  from  the  assumption  that  a 
general  tendency  to  note  certain  conditions,  with 
whatever  degree  of  indirectness,  is  in  itself  evi- 
dence for  the  correctness  and  importance  of  the 
observations  and  at  once  furnishes  and  justifies 
the  impulse  to  correlate  all  cognate  observations 
as  a  means  of  dealing  adequately  with  the  ques- 
tion of  their  total  significance.  And  with  this 
final  question  of  significance  to  be  met,  there 
must  be  a  return  to  the  sharply  defined  theoreti- 
cal connection. 

I  make  now  curt  experimental  assumption 
first  of  the  complexity  of  the  whole  verse-struc- 
ture as  stated  in  my  second  thesis :  second  of  the 
classification  of  vocabularies  as  stated  in  my  first 


A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS  51 

thesis :  and,  finally,  I  shall  add  to  these,  since  it  is 
not  here  under  direct  discussion,  such  assump- 
tions regarding  the  verse-form  proper  as  are 
necessary  to  my  argument. 

I  must  obviously,  where  the  verse-form  itself  is 
concerned,  work  with  reference  to  a  primary 
classification  according  to  rhythm.  I  assume, 
therefore,  the  existence  in  English  verse  of  two 
main  rhythms,  duple  and  triple,  each  existing  in 
two  varieties:  duple  rhythm,  rising  and  falling, 
and  triple  rhythm,  rising  and  falling.  In  duple 
rhythm  the  "normal"  syllabic  unit,  or  foot,  con- 
tains two  syllables:  in  triple  rhythm  three  syl- 
lables; the  difference  in  cadence,  whether  rising 
or  falling,  is  determined  by  the  position  of  the 
"strong"  or  "accented"  syllable.  This  is  to  fol- 
low more  particularly  Mr.  Omond's  suggested 
classification  {A  Study  of  Metre)  and  it  is  Mr. 
Omond's  whole  theory  that  I  have  at  this  point 
most  in  mind;  however  the  terms  are,  I  think, 
widely  enough  used  to  be  generally  intelligible 
without  special  explanation  and  their  relation  to 
the  more  frequently  used  classical  terms  suffi- 
ciently obvious.  The  correspondence  of  the  two 
sets  of  terms  barely  needs  stating;  what  is  here 


52  A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS 

called  verse  in  duple  rhythm,  rising  cadence,  is 
identifiable  with  the  English  verse  called 
''iambic":  duple  rhythm,  falling  cadence,  with 
"trochaic":  triple  rhythm,  rising  cadence,  with 
"anapsestic" :  triple  rhythm,  falling  cadence, 
with  "dactylic."  As  to  the  correctness  of  the  de- 
scription implied  in  either  set  of  terms  there  is 
much  question;  as  to  the  verse  to  be  identified 
(even  with  the  rejection  of  both  descriptions) 
very  little. 

Given  these  assumptions,  my  first  point  is  that 
an  exact  study  of  verse-technique  requires  spe- 
cialized reference  to  each  of  the  main  kinds  of 
rhythm,  in  their  two  varieties,  since  with  the 
changes  in  the  structural  unit  appearing  as 
norm,  the  conditions  of  the  problem  change. 
This,  which  would  be  true  even  were  a  simple 
structure  concerned,  is  in  a  complex  entity  of 
essential  importance  since  with  a  change  in  any 
one  of  the  arrangements  a  whole  new  series  of 
inter-relationships  is  established. 

And,  further,  for  the  same  reason,  specialized 
reference  to  the  main  kinds  of  rhythm  is  not 
alone  sufficient,  but  there  must  be  such  reference 
to  each  kind  in  rhythm  as  correlated  with  each 


A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS  53 


kind  in  vocabulary.  The  primary  classification 
as  to  rhythm — the  final  aesthetic  condition — 
must,  that  is,  be  correlated  with  the  primary 
classification  of  structural  phonetic  conditions 
in  language — the  medium — before  a  complete 
statement  of  the  technical  problem  is  possible. 
We  must  in  each  particular  case  know  whether 
we  have  the  rhythm,  duple  or  triple,  operating  in 
relation  to  a  vocabulary  of  the  mono-dissyllabic 
type,  or  of  the  type  of  medium  or  of  extreme 
structural  complexity.  Thus  what  would  be,  if 
English  vocabularies  showed  a  uniform  struc- 
tural character,  two  main  specialized  conditions 
becomes,  with  the  assumed  differentiations,  six 
main  specialized  conditions — (or  twelve,  allow- 
ing for  the  two  varieties  in  each  rhythm) . 

This  evidently  gives,  in  effect,  a  general 
scheme  for  the  study  of  English  verse  technique, 
necessarily  resulting  from  the  assumptions  made 
as  to  the  principles  of  verse-structure  as  a  whole, 
a  scheme  which  at  once  summarizes  within  itself 
its  determining  principles  and  furnishes  the  basis 
for  their  further  analytical  testing. 

First  illustrative  application  of  the  method 
suggested  may  be  rapidly  outlined  with  refer- 


54  A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS 

ence  to  the  problem  which  arises  in  connection 
with  syllables  carrying  secondary  word-accent, 
where  the  question  at  issue  is  whether  these  syl- 
lables can  be  used  as  "accented"  (or  "long"  or 
"strong")  syllables  in  verse.  This  has  already 
been  noted  (p.  36)  as  a  controversial  question 
and  that  it  has  become  so  may  fairly  be  regarded 
as  indicating  its  importance.  I  am  here  con- 
cerned with  noting  the  connections  which  must 
be  established  as  a  condition  of  its  adequate 
treatment,  not  with  the  statement  or  discussion 
of  the  problem  within  itself. 

In  approaching,  then,  the  systematic  study  of 
the  problem  of  secondary  word-accent  there  must 
be,  in  accordance  with  the  scheme  outlined,  first 
reference  to  the  structural  character  of  the  vo- 
cabulary. Where  there  is  a  purely  mono-dissyl- 
labic vocabulary  the  problem  obviously  does  not 
exist;  on  the  other  hand  in  the  extreme  polysyl- 
labic vocabulary,  where  secondary  accent- 
syllables  reach  their  highest  occurrence,  the 
problem  is  present  in  its  most  acute  form.  In 
one  case,  to  leave  it  for  the  moment  in  terms  of 
extremes,    the   poet   would    have   worked,    nat- 


A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS  55 


urally,  with  no  reference  to  a  non-existent  condi- 
tion; in  the  other,  reference  to  an  acutely  exist- 
ing condition  would  have  been  a  constantly  de- 
termining factor  in  the  development  of  the  tech- 
nique as  a  whole. 

Statement  in  exact  terms  of  the  occurrence  of 
the  problem  requires,  next,  correlation  of  the 
rhythmic  condition  with  the  structural  units  of 
the  vocabulary.  Here  I  shall  limit  myself  to  the 
barest  indication  of  the  central  issue  given  with 
reference  to  verse  in  duple  rhythm,  rising  ca- 
dence ("iambic")  and  in  triple  rhythm,  rising 
cadence  ("anapsestic").  The  fuller  and  finer 
statement  of  the  initial  problem  and  the  question 
of  its  solution — the  way,  that  is,  in  which  Eng- 
lish poets  have  actually  dealt  with  it — must  be 
left  for  later,  separate  discussion. 

Concisely  given  the  issue  is  this.  When  the 
verse  is  in  duple  rhythm  (rising)  the  occurrence 
of  every  word  over  two  syllables  in  length  except 
mid-stress  trisyllables  will,  if  the  "normal"  dis- 
syllabic foot  is  to  be  kept,  force  the  occuiTence  of 
a  syllable  carrying  secondary  word-accent  in  the 
verse-accent  place :  e,  g. 


56  A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS 

To  whom  thus  ^lichael.    Death  thou  hast  seen  P.  L. 

XI.  466. 

IthuneZ  and  Zephon  with  winged  speed  P.  L.  IV. 

788. 

If  on  the  other  hand  there  is  non-occurrence  of 
the  secondary  accent-syllable  in  this  place  condi- 
tions arise  which  immediately  bring  up  the  ques- 
tion of  the  admission  of  variant  feet.  The  most 
usual  condition  of  non-occurrence  is  illustrated 
in  the  following  lines : 

Saw  where  the  sword  of  ^lichael  smote,  and  fell'd 
P.  L.  VI.  250. 

Him  thus  intent  IthuWeZ  with  his  spear  P.  L.  IV. 

810. 

or  to  show  both  occurrence  and  non-occurrence  in 
the  same  line : 

A  second  T>amel !  a  DanzeZ,  Jew !  Merch.  of 

Ven. 

In  triple  rhythm  verse  (rising)  the  points  to  be 
noted  are  that  non-occurrence  of  the  secondary 
accent-syllable  results  in  establishing  a  "normal" 
trisyllabic  foot: 

A  sensitive  plant  in  a  garden  grew 

And  the  hyacinth  purple,  and  white  and  blue 

The  Sensitive  Plant. 


A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS  57 


or  in  establishing  the  condition  illustrated  in  the 
following  lines  where  there  is  evidently  at  least 
the  possibility  of  a  four-syllable  foot  to  be  con- 
sidered : 


The  leaves  they  were  -withering  and  sere 
Our  talk  had  been  serious  and  sober 


Ulalume. 


while  the  occurrence  of  the  secondary-accent  syl- 
lable in  the  verse-accent  place  must  result  in  es- 
tablishing a  variant  dissyllabic  unit: 

The  snow  drop  and  then  the  violet 

The  water-blooms   under   the   rivulet 

The  Sensitive  Plant. 

Thus,  in  the  main,  there  is  an  important  reversal 
in  the  terms  of  the  occurrence  of  the  problem 
with  the  change  of  rhythm. 

Systematic  scrutiny  of  the  problem,  then, 
shows  its  absence  or  presence  (and  in  what  de- 
gree) as  resulting  from  the  structural  character 
of  the  vocabulary.  It  shows  that  given  the  prob- 
lem as  a  whole  an  important  difference  in  its  oc- 
currence results  from  changes  in  the  rhythmic 
condition  and  in  so  doing  makes  clear  the  close 
inter-connection  at  this  point  of  the  question  of 


58  A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS 

secondary  word-accent  with  the  question  of  the 
admission  of  variant  feet.  Seen  from  this  angle 
there  is  obviously  established  an  important  con- 
nection for  the  study  of  the  central  matter  of  in- 
terest as  regards  the  verse-form  proper — the  syl- 
labic variation  occurring  within  the  condition  of 
rhythmic  uniformity.  And  there  is  a  further 
connection  which  may  be  just  indicated — the 
connection  with  the  problem  of  weighting.  It  is 
to  be  noted  that  there  is  here  question  of  making 
syllables  not  only  of  secondary  value  in  word- 
accent,  but  often  in  themselves  extremely  light 
syllables,  carry  verse-accent;  and  this,  if  it  seem 
to  present  a  difficulty  in  duple  rhythm  where  a 
"normal"  foot  is  concerned,  will  probably  be  felt 
to  present  an  increased  difficulty  in  triple  rhythm 
where  it  will  give  a  light  syllable  as  the  strong, 
or  active,  member  of  a  foot  already,  in  terms  of 
the  rhythmic  norm,  short  of  its  full  amount  of 
sound  material. 

This,  however  stumblingly  put,  will  serve  to 
indicate  in  what  way  a  scheme  of  correlated  ob- 
servations logically  resultant  from  a  consistent 
view  of  verse-structure  as  a  whole  will  allow  the 
posing  of  a  whole  problem,  its  limits  defined,  its 


A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS  59 


connections  established.  And  it  is  a  little  diffi- 
cult to  see  how,  short  of  such  schematic  treat- 
ment, whether  this  or  a  righter  one,  it  will  ever 
be  possible  really  to  get  anj^where. 

A  second  and  if  less  systematic  perhaps  more 
immediately  vivid  illustration  of  the  method  sug- 
gested may  be  indicated  in  terms  of  the  poems 
already  analyzed.  And  here,  lest  I  seem  guilty 
of  evasion,  I  must  dare,  if  ever  so  tentatively, 
foreshadowing  answer  to  that  question  which  is 
after  all  the  final  test  of  validity — but  how  far  is 
all  this  necessary  as  a  basis  of  right  judgment? 
That  I  cannot,  in  the  present  stage  of  the  work, 
go  beyond  the  tentative  and  the  foreshadowing 
(and  in  rather  informal  manner)  is  too  clear  to 
need  emphasis. 

What  the  19th  century  thought  of  itself,  what 
it  thought  of  the  18th  century,  what  we  are  to 
think  of  the  19th  century,  its  work  and  its  judg- 
ments— these  are,  I  suppose,  for  whom  such 
things  exist  at  all,  questions  most  alluring.  And 
the  allurement,  unless  one  is  the  more  deceived, 
is  the  ringing  allurement  of  challenge.  There  is 
a  present  extraordinaiy  aliveness  in  the  air,  a 
sharp   exhilaration.     We  take  poetry  seriously 


60  A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS 

and    feel    ourselves    confronted    with    immortal 
issues. 

The  names  of  Tennyson  and  Swinburne  are 
two  of  the  latest  to  be  given  great  praise  and  lat- 
terly there  has  been  some  sound  of  dispraise.  In 
the  case  of  Tennyson  a  recent  discussion  gives 
for  the  matter  this  statement : 

"The  hosts  of  criticism,  until  lately  subdued  to  a  common 
domination_,  are  now  divided  and  there  is  no  denying  that 
the  younger  generation  is  distinctly  hostile.  And  this  at- 
titude represents  a  corresponding  hostility  among  a  consid- 
erable (and  that  not  the  least  intelligent)  section  of  the  pub- 
lic. It  is  idle  to  ignore  this  antipathy,  idle  to  pretend  that 
it  has  not  some  real  justification.  .  .  .  What  then  is  the 
gravamen  of  the  charge  against  Tennyson.^  It  is  not 
surely  any  allegation  of  technical  insufficiency.  Indeed  one 
suspects  that  recognition  of  the  poet's  commanding  tech- 
nical power  adds  not  a  little  to  the  bitterness  of  the  hostile 
feeling.  It  is  rather  as  a  'thinker'  (vile  phrase !)  that  Ten- 
nyson is  attacked"  (Tennyson  and  the  Critics^  The  Spec- 
tator, Feb.  22,  1913). 

It  is  worth  raising  as  a  first  question  whether 
there  is  not  in  all  of  this  an  odd  over-statement. 
Is  there  really  on  the  part  of  the  younger  gene- 
ration hostility,  or  is  it  indifference?  Though  in- 
deed it  makes  an  instant  retort  that  precisely  in- 
difference is  of  all  hostilities,  if  the  stillest,  there- 
fore the  most  deadly.  But  whatever  name  it  be 
given,  the  difference  of  attitude,  the  greater  cool- 


A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS  61 


ness  or  the  lesser  warmth,  is  the  significant  fact; 
to  account  for  it  the  problem.  If  I  now  take 
refuge  in  an  increasing  use  of  the  pronoun  of  the 
first  person  it  will  be  recognized,  I  hope,  as  being 
not  the  I  of  arrogance  but  the  I  of  humility  and 
caution.  Just  what  may  be  in  the  composite 
mind  of  a  total  hungry  generation  I  should 
scarce  venture  to  say ;  I  can  but  make  sober  and 
faithful  report  of  what  part  of  it  is  known  to  me 
as  mine. 

And  for  Tennyson  my  answer  to  any  such 
statement  as  that  which  I  have  just  quoted 
would  be  this.  It  is  not  a  matter  of  bringing 
"charges"  against  him  but  of  finding  out  what 
his  work  really  is ;  and  while  there  is  not  exactly 
"allegation  of  technical  insufficiency"  the  ques- 
tion of  technique  is  nevertheless  at  issue. 
Throughout  the  whole  discussion  cited  as  well  as 
in  the  few  sentences  which  I  have  quoted,  the 
terms  used  in  speaking  of  Tennyson's  technique 
seem  to  me  to  show  very  great  exaggeration,  an 
exaggeration  which  results  from  the  assumption 
of  an  illegitimate  comparison.  I  quote  another 
sentence  in  further  illustration: 


62  A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS 

"Far  and  leisured  was  the  journeying  which  enabled  him 
to  master  the  principles  of  rhythm  and  modulation  estab- 
lished by  his  great  precursors  and  elaborate  them  to  a^  pitch 
of  perfection  and  variety  which  no  other  poet  has  ever 
equalled." 

And  I  add  as  expressing,  but  with  greater  defi- 
niteness,  the  same  way  of  thinking,  a  detached 
clause  from  a  sentence  in  Professor  White's  in- 
troduction to  his  study  of  the  verse  of  Greek 
comedy: —  ".  .  .  just  as  the  English  heroic 
line,  passing  from  Shakespeare  to  Milton  and 
from  Milton  on  to  Tennyson,  became  under  his 
magic  touch  a  new  instrument  of  melody  modu- 
lated to  every  theme"  (White  The  Verse  of 
Greek  Comedy,  p.  VII).  The  assumption,  im- 
plied in  the  discussion  of  The  Spectator,  directly 
expressed  by  Professor  White,  is  that  there  is  a 
literal  technical  advance  from  Milton  to  Tenny- 
son. Now  if  my  analysis  is  correct,  and  if  the 
whole  chain  of  reasoning  so  far  presented  is 
valid,  it  means  that  no  such  advance  can  exist,  at 
least  for  the  particular  poems  analyzed,  since  in 
them  Milton  and  Tennyson  work  with  reference 
to  differentiated  technical  problems.  Milton 
deals  with  the  problems  that  I  have  indicated  as 
inherent  in  a  vocabulary  of  extreme  structural 


A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS  63 

complexity;  his  greater  variety  of  word-forms 
imposes  upon  him  all  the  difficulties  of  their 
manipulation,  problems  of  weighting,  of  the 
management  of  the  delicate,  and  treacherous, 
secondary  accent  syllables,  and  with  these,  since 
it  is  verse  in  duple  rhythm,  the  question  of  vari- 
ant feet.  These  things  if  present  for  Tennyson 
are  far  less  acutely  present  and  with  the  change 
in  the  basic  condition  of  the  vocabulary,  the 
whole  weighting  and  balance  of  the  line  change. 

Any  literal  technical  comparison  between 
Tennyson  and  Milton  seems  to  me,  then,  to  fall 
to  the  ground.  The  proper  comparison,  as  I 
make  it  out,  is  between  Tennyson  and  Pope.  I 
am  of  course  aware  that  there  are  between  these 
two  poets  important  secondary  differences,  es- 
pecially, as  to  interlinear  connection,  the  differ- 
ence between  blank  and  rhymed  verse,  and  the 
different  management  of  grammatical  pause; 
but  these  do  seem  to  me  secondary  differences 
and  unquestionably  important  as  they  are,  I  can- 
not quite  see  how  they  can  be  allowed  in  any 
sound  criticism  to  obscure  the  perception  of  a 
primary  likeness. 

Of  Swinburne's  craftsmanship  there  has  been 


64  A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS 

much  superlative  speaking  and  again,  with  all 
deference,  it  seems  to  me  an  exaggerated  speak- 
ing. Comparison  has  not  been  made  between  his 
and  the  Miltonic  technique  in  the  specific  matter 
of  the  decasyllabic  (where  I  think  no  one  asserts 
for  Swinburne  any  absolute  supremacy)  and  the 
question  shifts  to  another  ground.  This  I  can 
best  present  by  quoting  two  judgments  lately 
expressed  by  Professor  Gilbert  Murray  in  his 
address — What  English  Poetry  May  Still 
Learn  from  the  Greek: 

"Professed  imitations  of  Greek  rhythm  in  English  poetry- 
seem  to  me  to  have  gone  practically  always  on  quite  wrong 
lines.  They  ought  to  have  been  more  intensely  rhythmical 
than  the  average;  as  a  matter  of  fact  they  think  they  are 
being  Greek  when  they  lose  lyrical  rhythm  altogether. 
Swinburne,  as  usual,  as  far  as  metre  is  concerned,  gets 
triumphantly  to  the  heart  of  the  matter: 

She  is  cold  and  her  habit  is  lowly, 
Her  temple  of  branches  and  sods; 

Most  fruitful  and  virginal,  holy, 
A  mother  of  Gods. 

That  has  a  strong  clear  rhythm,  full  of  majesty  and  sweet- 
ness. .  .  .  But  if  you  take,  let  us  say,  the  most  admired 
lyrics  in  Samson  Agonistes: 

God  of  our  fathers,  what  is  man? 

That  thou  towards  him  with  a  hand  so  various. 

Or  might  I  say  contrarious, 

Temper'st  thy  providence  through  his  short  course, 

Not  evenly,  as  thou  rul'st 


A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS  65 

The  angelic  orders  and  inferior  creatures,  mute. 
Irrational,  and  brute; 


or, 


This,  this  is  he:  softly  a  while; 

Let  us  not  break  in  upon  him.  ... 

Or  do  my  eyes  misrepresent.^     Can  this  be  he. 

That  heroic,  that  renowned 

Irresistible  Samson,  whom  unarmed 

No  strength  of  man  or  fiercest  wild  beast  could  withstand? 

Who  tore  the  lion  as  the  lion  tears  the  kid  .  .  . 

This  may  be  poetry  of  the  highest  order;  I  can  quite  im- 
agine that  those  who  know  it  by  heart  even  enj  oy  the  rhythm 
of  it.  But  surely  it  is  clear  that  the  rhythm  is  exceedingly 
obscure  and  utterly  unlyrical  in  quality?" 

Professor  Murray  is  in  all  these  matters  of  the 
elect,  "a  Roman  of  Rome  and  very  well  thought 
of  in  Heaven" ;  yet  may  I,  even  with  a  little  de- 
corous impishness,  suggest  that  his  words  con- 
cerning Milton  have  familiar  sound  .  .  . 
"one  of  the  poems  upon  which  much  praise  has 
been  bestowed  ...  of  which  the  diction  is 
harsh  .  .  .  the  numbers  unpleasing"  .  .  . 
and  thus,  remembering  that  the  great  Doctor 
himself  on  occasions  erred,  gather  courage  for 
disagreement? 

Setting  aside  the  question  of  Greek  metres 

Notes — In  the  quotations  from  Samson  Agonistes  I  have  kept  the  punctuation 
given  by  Mr.  Murray  in  his  printed  paper  {Essays  and  Studies  by  Members  of  the  Eng- 
lish Association,  Vol.  HI,  p.  27) .  It  is  not  the  punctuation  given  in  Canon  Beeching's 
reprint  of  the  edition  of  1671. 

The  absurdity  "with  a  hand"  must  be  (I  suppose)  a  misprint. 


66  A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS 

(about  which  I,  all  woefully,  know  nothing)  and 
holding  to  the  question  of  English  metres,  in 
English  poetry  after  all  undeviatingly  the  main 
concern,  the  issue  raised  by  any  such  statement 
seems  to  me  to  be  this.  The  lines  quoted  by 
Professor  Murray  from  Swinburne  are  in  triple 
rhythm  and  it  is  Swinburne's  handling  of  this 
rhythm  that,  at  any  rate  "as  far  as  metre  is  con- 
cerned," is  oftenest  given  the  unqualified  en- 
thusiasm of  which  I  have  spoken.  It  leaps  to  the 
mind  in  instant  question — am  I  then  to  suppose 
that  Swinburne's  technique  in  triple  rhythm  is 
held  to  be,  in  general,  comparable  to  the  Miltonic 
technique  in  duple  rhythm?  It  is  for  me  an 
effort  to  phrase  or  squarely  to  envisage  a  notion 
so  bewildering.  Yet  Professor  Murray  seems  to 
make  the  comparison^and  to  the  discomfiture  of 
Milton.  If  imperturbability  is  for  a  moment 
wind-blown  by  gusty  amazements  it  will  be  I 
hope  forgiven  me.  After  all  there  is  difficulty  in 
remaining  imperturbable  when  one  whose  schol- 
arship imposes  an  all  wistful  deference  is  heard 
saying  that  he  ''can  imagine"  it  possible  that  one 
may  "even  enjoy"  the  rhythm  of  the  Samson 
Choruses.    For  this  long  while  the  mere  phrase 


A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS  67 


"he  knows  Greek"  has  seemed  to  me,  one  de- 
prived and  in  exile,  almost,  for  its  potency,  a 
magic  formula;  yet  here,  and  for  not  the  first 
time,  I  meet  what  I  must  believe  to  be  a  pro- 
found and  subtle  initiation  in  the  aesthetics  of 
Greek  literature  coupled  with  what  I  cannot 
force  my  mind  to  see  as  other  than  an  amazing 
unawareness  of  the  subtleties  of  the  English 
forms.  It  is  not  possible  to  live  at  peace  in  the 
company  of  a  bewilderment  of  this  sort  and  at 
least  I  have  tried  to  find  out  what  I  mean.  What 
they  mean,  those  more  blessed  others  who  "know 
Greek,"  I  can  only,  with  every  real  and  humblest 
questioning,  continue  to  ask. 

And  what,  in  the  present  instance,  I  mean, 
since  to  justify  my  words  I  must  here  make  re- 
port, is  this.  The  general  point  made  for  Tenny- 
son and  Milton  in  the  matter  of  the  decasyllabic 
will  hold,  within  the  limits  of  the  analysis  pre- 
sented, in  the  case  of  Swinburne  and  Milton  with 
reference  to  the  decasyllabic,  but  also,  and  more 
importantly,  with  reference  to  the  different 
rhythms.  Swinburne,  that  is,  in  the  poems 
analyzed,  works  with  vocabularies  of  the  simpler 
sort,  either  decidedly  mono-dissyllabic  or  of  the 


68  A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS 

medium  type  with  the  lower  occurrence  of  poly- 
syllables; and  the  different  structural  condition 
in  the  vocabularies  makes  impossible,  it  seems  to 
me,  for  the  reasons  already  given,  any  direct 
technical  comparison  between  his  problem  in 
triple  rh5i;hm  and  Milton's  in  duple. 

Further,  this,  as  I  make  it  out,  has  an  impor- 
tant bearing  on  our  understanding  of  the  his- 
torical development  of  triple  rhytlims  in  English 
poetry.  Such  a  comparison  as  Professor  Mur- 
ray's seems  at  any  rate  to  imply  that  we  find  in 
Swinburne  a  poet  using  all  the  resources  of  the 
language;  in  the  analysis  presented  it  is  seen 
that  Swinburne  works  within  a  very  limited 
range.  Unless  he  can  be  shown  to  have  made 
exclusions  for  special  technical  purposes,  this,  if 
it  holds  for  his  work  in  general,  means  I  think 
that  we  find  in  him  not  a  highly  developed  but  an 
early  technique.  He  has  not  mastered  all  the 
resources  of  the  language;  he  has  not  even  di- 
vined their  existence. 

Between  Milton  and  Swinburne  there  would 
then  be  this  tremendously  significant  difference, 
that  one  stands  at  the  end  of  a  long  sequence  in 
development,  the  other  at  the  beginning  of  a 


A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS  69 


sequence.  And  it  scarce  needs  the  saying  that 
there  is  here  that  which  gives  special  direction 
to  all  the  alertness  of  one's  mind  and  sense. 
Suppose  we  are  moving  in  the  great  main  line  of 
development  in  English  poetry  towards  a  mas- 
tery of  triple  rhythms  really  comparable  to  the 
Samson  Choruses?  Isn't  that,  then,  the  essential 
clue  ?    And  without  it  where  are  we  ? 

The  bearing  of  all  this  on  the  final  question  of 
exact  discriminations  is,  I  think,  clear.  If  it  be 
true,  as  I  have  suggested,  that  we  approach,  by 
intelligible  stages,  a  completer  understanding  of 
the  whole  complexity  of  English  verse-structure, 
it  follows  that  our  scrutiny  will  contain  within  it- 
self a  whole  series  of  re-actions  which,  as  felt  not 
at  all,  or  felt  in  some  degree  short  of  complete 
awareness,  did  not  enter  into  the  making  of  nine- 
teenth century  judgments.  It  presents  itself  as 
a  not  unreasonable  contention  that,  given  its  ex- 
istence, such  an  increase  in  fully  conscious  per- 
ception would  be,  necessarily,  an  essential  factor 
in  determining  any  critical  re-estimation  of 
values  that  may  lie  before  us. 

An  opposite  opinion  is,  I  know,  possible;  but 
I  confess  that  there  is  for  me  an  inherent  per- 


70  A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS 

suasiveness  in  the  notion  that  finer  comprehen- 
sions reflect  themselves  in  finer  and  righter  judg- 
ments. 


It  may  be  well  to  add  brief  safe-guard  against 
possible  misunderstanding  at  one  point,  where 
the  types  of  vocabularies  are  concerned  the  sole 
intent  has  been  to  discover  and  state  possible  dif- 
ferences. There  is  no  question  whatever  of 
translating  these  differences  into  absolute  terms 
of  better  and  worse.  That  English  poetrj^  may, 
in  its  vocabularies,  possess  a  richness  and  com- 
plexity of  three  instead  of  a  limited  one  is  now 
the  first  consideration. 

The  next,  which  must  be  left  for  far  fuller 
treatment,  will  concern  the  special  conditions  of 
achievement  or  failure  within  each  type.  Here 
but  a  single  point  may  be  glanced  at  as  inti- 
mately connected  with  the  work  just  discussed. 
How  far  is  it  likely,  I  wonder,  that  the  question 
of  the  long  poem  will  become  in  this  connection 
an  important  one?  Evidently  dependence  on  a 
mono-dissyllabic  vocabulary  for  the  short  lyric 
is  one  thing;  its  use  in  a  poem  of  the  length  of 
Chastelard  another. 


A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS  71 


And,  finally,  in  dealing  with  observations  of 
this  kind  it  must  be  remembered  that  the  poet's 
own  awareness  of  his  work,  the  extent  to  which 
his  activity  is  felt  to  be  consciously  directed,  is 
always  a  factor  to  be  reckoned  with.  Again,  rea- 
soned exclusions  are  one  thing;  exclusions  that 
are  accidental  and  quite  unrealized  by  the  poet 
himself,  are  another. 


NOTE 

The  work  I  wish  to  do  next  deals  with  the 
problem  of  secondary-accent  (pp.  53-57).  The 
analysis  is  already  completed  except  for  general 
re-testing.  It  was  in  fact  the  analysis  from 
which  the  generalization  as  to  the  differentiated 
vocabularies  was  originally  derived.  It  includes 
Gascoigne's  "Steele  Glas,"  ''Tamburlaine,"  I 
and  II,  "Lycidas,"  ''Paradise  Lost,"  "Samson 
Agonistes,"  "An  Essay  on  Criticism,"  "The 
Rape  of  the  Lock"  and  "Hyperion." 

The  most  generally  interesting  points,  I  fancy, 
would  be  the  comparisons  in  technique  between 
"Paradise  Lost"  and  "Samson  Agonistes"  and 
between  "Paradise  Lost"  and  "Hyperion." 

It  seems  to  me  that  statement  of  the  technical 
difference  at  this  point  between  the  blank  verse 
of  Milton  and  that  of  Keats  throws  a  good  deal 
of  light  on  Tennyson's  work. 


73 


ADDITIONAL  ANALYSIS 

While  it  cannot  now  be  systematically  dis- 
cussed, tabulated  analysis  is  here  given  showing 
(a)  for  all  the  poems  previously  examined,  the 
separate  percentages  for  the  occurrence  of 
monosyllables  and  dissyllables  (Tables  VII- 
XII)  and  (b),  for  some  few  of  the  poems,  the 
percentage  of  occurrence  within  the  dissyllabic 
group  as  a  whole  of  dissyllables  accented  on  the 
last  syllable.     ( Tables  XIII-XV. ) 

These  tables,  that  is,  contain  preliminary  data 
for  the  closer  study  of  the  mono-dissyllabic 
group  hitherto  treated  as  a  whole,  giving  the  dis- 
tribution of  the  two  main  types  included  within 
it,  and,  further,  of  the  two  sub-types  included 
within  the  whole  dissyllabic  group.  The  closer 
study  of  the  polysyllabic  group  must  be  carried 
out  in  the  same  way. 

This  detailed  analysis  will  give  (as  the  pre- 
vious analysis  for  the  larger  groupings)  exacter 
information  as  to  the  whole  range  of  occurrence 

of  types   and   sub-types  considered   separately, 

74     ' 


A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS  75 


and  as  to  their  relative  occurrence  in  specific  vo- 
cabularies. For  instance,  as  to  range  of  occur- 
rence, that  there  are  "many"  monosyllables  in 
English  means,  in  verse,  according  to  these  re- 
sults, a  per  cent  occurrence  running  from  the 
71.43%  of  "Oenone"  or  the  73.39%  of  "Samson 
Agonistes"  to  the  89.46%  of  "Chastelard"— 
(and,  of  course,  to  the  100%  found  sometimes  in 
short  poems).  Roughly,  that  is,  it  is  probable 
that  of  the  whole  number  of  words  in  any  Eng- 
lish poem,  at  least  70%  are  monosyllables. 
Again  the  fact  that,  in  English,  dissyllables  ac- 
cented on  the  first  outnumber  those  accented  on 
the  last  syllable  means,  as  here  recorded,  a  range 
of  occurrence  for  the  rarer  sub-type  (within  the 
group  as  a  whole)  running  from  the  35.30%  of 
"Samson  Agonistes"  down  to  the  11.11%  of 
"The  Forsaken  Garden"— (and  to  the  0%  found 
sometimes  in  shorter  poems). 

Tables  giving  separate  percentages  for  the 
occurrence  of  monosyllables  and  dissyllables  fol- 
low on  pages  76-78. 


76  A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS 


Table  VII. 

Milton 

Total  per  cent 
Mono- 
dissyllabic 

Per  cent 
Monosyllabic 

Per  cent 
Dissyllabic 

Paradise  Lost 

I 

91.67 

72.06 

19.61 

II 

92.24 

73.13 

19.11 

Ill 

92.07 

73.30 

18.77 

IV 

92.74 

75.23 

17.51 

V 

92.01 

73.41 

18.60 

VI 

90.95 

72.31 

18.64 

VII 

91.40 

73.14 

18.26 

VIII 

91.45 

74.65 

16.80 

IX 

93.01 

74.52 

18.49 

X 

91.74 

74.22 

17.52 

XI 

92.48 

74.51 

17.97 

XII 

91.78 

73.81 

17.97 

Total.... 

92.03 

73.75 

18  28 

Samson  Agonistes 

Dialogue . . . 

92.04 

73.98 

18.06 

Choruses . . 

90.92 

71.72 

19.20 

Total.... 

91.75 

73.39 

18.36 

Table  VIII.     Pope 


Total  per  cent 
Mono- 
dissyllabic 


Per  cent 
Monosyllabic 


Per  cent 
Dissyllabic 


Essay  on  Criticism 

The  Rape  of  the  Lock . .  . 
Elegy — Unfortunate  Lady 

Essay  on  Man     I 

II 

Ill 

IV 

Total 

Epistle  to  Dr.  Arbuthnot 


94.91 
94.71 
95.86 

94.32 
94.32 
94.43 
95.54 

94.72 

95.91 


74.83 
74.59 
77.15 

75.26 
73.39 
75.57 
76.98 

75.45 

77.66 


20.09 
20.12 
18.71 

19.06 
20.93 
18.86 
18.56 

19.27 

18.25 


A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS  77 


Table  IX. 


Tennyson 


Total  per  cent 
Mono- 
dissyllabic 


Per  cent 
Monosyllabic 


Per  cent 
Dissyllabic 


Oenone 

Ulysses 

Tithonus 

The  Coming  of  Arthur. 
Merlin  and  Vivien .... 
Lancelot  and  Elaine . . . 

The  Holy  Grail 

Guinevere ,  . 

The  Passing  of  Arthur. 


94.31 
96.94 
96.33 
96.54 
95.88 
95.83 
96.48 
95.68 
96.59 


71.43 
79.32 
78.14 
81.08 
79.69 
81.46 
80.39 
81.28 
81.42 


22.88 
17.62 
18.19 
15.46 
16.19 
14.37 
16.09 
14.40 
15.17 


Table  X. 

Swinburne 

Total  per  cent 
Mono- 
dissyllabic 

Per  cent 
Monosyllabic 

Per  cent 
Dissyllabic 

Chastelard     I 

98.59 
98.56 
98.65 
98.30 
98.18 

98.42 

95.84 
96.83 

96.14 

97.50 
97.03 

98.80 

89.13 

89.18 
90.17 
90.22 

88.57 

89.46 

82.48 
81.50 

82.19 

82.35 
81.76 
84.05 

9.46 

II 

Ill 

IV 

9.38 
8.48 
8.08 

V 

9.61 

Total 

8.96 

Atalanta  in  Calydon 
Dialogue 

13.36 

Choruses 

15.33 

Total 

13.95 

Hymn  to  Proserpine 

Hesperia 

15.15 
15.27 

The  Forsaken  Garden  . .  . 

14.75 

78    A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS 


Table  XI. 


Francis  Thompson 


Total  per  cent 
Mono- 
dissyllabic 


Per  cent 
Monosyllabic 


Per  cent 
Dissyllabic 


The  Hound  of  Heaven 
An  Anthem  of  Earth  . . 

Sister  Songs    I 

II 

Total 


92.61 
90.59 

92.02 
92.11 

92.06 


76.18 
71.30 

74.41 
73.40 

73.72 


16.43 
19.29 

17.61 
18.71 

18.34 


Table  XII. 


Maurice  Hewlett 

Total  per  cent 
Mono- 
dissyllabic 

Per  cent 
Monosyllabic 

Per  cent 
Dissyllabic 

Minos,  King  of  Crete .... 

Ariadne  in  Naxos 

Death  of  Hippolytus .... 

96.41 
95.92 
95.96 

81.08 
78.57 
79.22 

15.33 
17.35 
16.74 

Tables  giving  the  percentage  of  occurrence 
within  the  dissyllabic  group  as  a  whole  of  dissyl- 
lables accented  on  the  last  syllables  (type L) 

follow  on  pages  79-80. 


A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS  79 


Table  XIII.     Milton 

Per  cent 

Dissyllables  in 

whole  vocabulary 

Per  cent  type !- 

in  total  no. 
of  Dissyllables 

Paradise  Lost        I 

19.61 

26.17 

II 

19.11 

32.91 

Ill 

18.77 

31.96 

IV 

17.51 

31.94 

V 

18.60 

33.20 

VI 

18.64 

34,75 

VII 

18.26 

30.04 

VIII 

16.80 

39.17 

IX 

18.49 

37.27 

X 

17.52 

37.28 

XI 

17.97 

37.38 

XII 

17.97 

35.44 

Total 

18.28 

34.05 

Samson  Agonistes 

Dialogue 

18.06 

35.16 

Choruses 

19.20 

35.61 

Total 

18.36 

35.30 

Table  XIV.     Pope 

Per  cent 

Dissyllables  in 

whole  vocabulary 

Per  cent  type - 

in  total  no. 
of  Dissyllables 

Essay  on  Criticism 

20.09 

31.62 

The  Rape  of  the  Lock 

Elegy — Unfortunate  Lady 

20.12 
18.71 

26.75 
26.22 

Essay  on  Man     I 

19.06 

26.14 

II 

20.93 

30.14 

Ill 

18.86 

32.69 

IV 

18.56 

30.18 

Total 

19.27 
18.25 

29.96 

Epistle  to  Dr.  Arbuthnot . . 

27.28 

80  A  STUDY  IN  ENGLISH  METRICS 


Table  XV. 


Per  cent 

Dissyllables  in 

whole  vocabulary 


Per  cent  type 

in  total  no. 
of  Dissyllables 


Tithonus 

The  Passing  of  Arthur . 

Chastelard 

Atalanta  in  Calydon . .  . 
The  Forsaken  Garden . . 
The  Hound  of  Heaven  . 

Sister  Songs 

Minos,  King  of  Crete  . . 


18.19 
15.17 
8.96 
13.95 
14.75 
16.43 
18.34 
15.33 


20.18 
18.97 
21.79 
20.42 
11.11 
19.69 
19.40 
16.29 


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